Misc. Snapshots in Time

I lived in Berlin from 1961-1964. The wall went up overnight, beginning with barbed wire thrown across and dividing the city, which by treaty was to be an open city. This violated the agreement reached by the WW-2 allies. Although US personnel could cross the boundary, German citizens could not. This arbitrary division split families and caused a lot of problems. People died trying to reach West Berlin. US people traveling out of Berlin to West Germany (West Berlin had become an island of freedom inside East German) were subject to search by armed guards. If you wanted to drive from Berlin to West Germany, you were given an allotted time—and you’d better make it. While I was there, JF Kennedy was assassinated and the Cuban Missile Crisis happened.

The Gap Between East & West Berlin at Checkpoint Charlie

Inside the Building was East Berlin, Outside West Berlin, Flowers mark where someone jumped to their death trying to escape

A photo from my home on Gössler-Straße, Circa 1962. The church is on a kind of circle at Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz. My father was in the Air Force at Tempelhof Air Force Base.

Matera Laser Ranging Observatory Era (Dec. 1993- May 2001) Photos. The MLRO project began at the end of 1993 / the beginning of 1994. It was a project to design, develop, build, integrate, test, and deliver a satellite and lunar laser ranging observatory that could also do two color ranging for ASI (the Italian Space Agency). The telescope was built in Pittsburgh, the dome in Jackson Mississippi, and most of the electronics and software were developed in in Maryland. We shipped to Italy at the end of 1999 and spent most of the next year in Italy, integrating with the facility and testing and training. These are a few of the many snapshots my team and I took. The system was developed to be the best of its kind in the world and featured a 60-inch (1.5m) astronomical quality telescope, a hybrid laser system based on a cw, mode-locked laser coupled with a regenerative amplifier to deliver short (<20 picosecond) pulses with a peak power of about 3 giga-watts, a timing system with a precision of 1 picosecond (a trillionth of a second) and it was highly automated with built in diagnostics and its own radar system to protect aircraft.

Matera is one of the oldest cities in the world and is located in the region of Basilicata in southern Italy. We made many friends there and I still return to visit every year or two.

Blank ULE Boule, before figure was put into the mirror

Uncoated mirror being polished and tested in the limestone mine

The primary mirror cell, force balancing of the dynamic floating mirror support system using strain gauges

The telescope parts being inspected, before assembly and painting

The MLRO facility being constructed near Matera

The main foundation being poured and hardening, before the support piers are added

The outer wall of the observatory, before the dome from Mississippi is added.

The top of the telescope pier, before the metal plate was added. The hole allows light to pass from and to the instrumentation rooms below

The telescope, before being shipped to Italy, in its test facility at Goddard

Cables that were run in the Goddard facility, after the racks had been removed from that corner

The 20 foot and 40-foot shipping containers arriving with other instruments and subsystems

John, putting up the meteorological assembly

Three of the instrumentation racks, placed in their thermally controlled area

The main laser in a faraday isolated area that is an environmentally controlled clean room.

The T/R Optics Table, in its own clean room

Lifting the telescope base into the dome

Lifting the telescope tube and elevation axis into the dome

The Radar system used to protect aircraft from the laser

With members of my team—a barbecue at Riccardo’s house

Goddard Space Flight Center—MLRO Shooting at Satellite. Taken from the base of the telescope.

Just a couple of photos from another project

NASA’s WB57-F performing a science mission

In Houston, 2010 for flight testing, the 747 used to move the shuttle was often parked next to the plane used to support our experiments

My Home Now—Woodland Park, Colorado

My Personal Attack Deer, Guarding the driveway

My Dual Sport bike, useful for getting around the mountain roads, and off road

Thanksgiving 2014—Pot Luck Dinner with friends at a bar

2012_10_01_20_29_54.pdf009 — Testing Topex/Poseidon satellite optical array element, Goddard Space Flight Center, Circa 1988 / 89

oct4004 — Wake Island circa 1970, refueling spot for 707’s crossing the Pacific between Japan and Hawaii.

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